


still i try to reach you

by ambitioncutsusdown



Category: The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-16
Updated: 2014-06-16
Packaged: 2018-02-04 22:32:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1795585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambitioncutsusdown/pseuds/ambitioncutsusdown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Hello. I am a third generation X200 android."</p>
            </blockquote>





	still i try to reach you

**Author's Note:**

> [inspired by this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhoYLp8CtXI)
> 
>  
> 
> sudden inspiration because of the video?
> 
> i'm not sure if i had to tag for minhogally because technically there isn't much interaction between them or anything super shippy, but the potential is there? 
> 
> also maybe i'll write a next part to go along with this, a follow up, but i'm not sure yet (if i get inspiration i probably will b/c this feels very unfinished for me as well)
> 
> (unbeta'd so sorry for any mistakes)

It’s not his first day in the lab, not by far, and it won’t be his last day either. He’s been working here for years (ever since he did his internship here and they decided to keep him around) so he’s seen many things come along.

So seeing how robots are made in the Advanced Computer Technology department? It really shouldn’t be something special.

But it feels special. It feels _different_ , although all the robots are the same and they’ve made at least two hundred of those already, even though technically they’re still in the test phase. They’re not ready to be sold yet, to be _used_ , but that doesn’t stop a bunch of high level engineers, roboticists and neuro-scientists from making as many as possible and testing them all out. “Observing the differences,” they call it.

Minho suspects they just want to play around with their technology and feel superior, because robots are something _new_.

For starters, they don’t look like robots. Almost. They look mostly human, they _behave_ human, and that will only get better when they get more test result and can update what they already have. Toys for big guys, Minho calls them. That’s probably what they’ll turn out to be in a few months.

The test phase is going well though – every robot they’ve created so far behaves well, listens to orders. They’re supposed to function as household helps or any of the like – a combination of cleaners and babysitters and people who walk your dog all in one person. Or machine.

Whatever you want to call it.

And today alone they’ve made two robots already, and it should be a routine, but then it isn’t anymore.

Then the head, the beginning, of their third robot of the day roll in, and it’s _different_.

Minho watches as it connects to their machines, how head gets attached to torso. Everything moves smoothly, clicks together like it should, and it’s almost hypnotizing to see how they’re forming a pseudo-human being right here, right underneath his eyes.

“Can you hear me?”

It’s Janson, Minho’s boss who speaks up, making him jump in surprise, and Minho’s almost opened his mouth to reply when it remembers it’s not him who he’s talking to.

It’s the robot.

“Yes,” it says, eyes slowly opening.

“ID?”

“Subject A3285”

It – he, Minho thinks. He’ll resemble someone male. It’ll be supposed to represent a male human being – speaks smoothly, without stuttering or that monotone tone of voice some of the others had.

“Can you move your head?”

The back of his skull gets attached, and once it’s in place, he turns his head from side to side, not looking at anything.

“Your eyes now.”

His stare is a little icy, a little fixated, but not empty. Something’s happening behind them, Minho thinks, and that something is not a cluster of wires and electronics. Still, he moves them perfectly.

“Cervical and optical animation check.”

Minho nods, writes that down. He knows this is an order directed at him – he’s here to take notes, the secretary, so to speak. Make sure their files are okay.

“Now give me your initialization text.”

Arms are added as well, hands and fingers following quickly after.

“Hello. I am a third generation X200 android. I can look after your house, do the cooking, mind the kids. I organize your appointments. I speak three hundred languages and I’m entire at your disposal as a sexual partner. No need to feed me or recharge me. I’m equipped to the quantic battery that makes me autonomous for 173 years. Do you want to give me a name?”

Machines keep moving while he talks, adding more wires and forming his chest, even putting in something close to resembling a heart. It’s beating; it’s what’ll keep him alive for the next, well, 173 years. Then he’ll either need a new heart – battery, Minho corrects himself – or he’ll be thrown away. Just like that.

 They fix his chest, closing it all up so none of that is visible.

“Yes,” Janson says again, “from now on, your name is –”

“Gally.”

It’s Minho who speaks up, catching everyone off guard, and they stare at him for a few seconds. No one says anything. Except…

“My name is Gally.”

He says it with a smile, like he’s savoring the taste of his name in his mouth, and Minho can’t help but return it.

(Gally looks good when he smiles, he thinks, and then immediately shakes his head to forget it. He’s not allowed to think that. Gally’s supposed to look like all the other androids that they’ve created. But still, he can’t get rid of the idea that there’s something _different_ about him. Something that’s unlike all the others.)

“Initialization and memorization check.”

Minho snaps out of his thoughts and nods, writes that down as well.

“Now can you move your arms?”

Gally lifts his arms, spreading them and slowly bringing them up, staring at them as they slowly lose their _lab_ label and change color, making them seem more human.

“Upper limb connection check,” his boss says even before Gally's done, not waiting another second before adding, “Say something in German.”

“Ich bin in der dritten Generation android. Ick kann nack Ihrem Haus aussehen, das Kochen, dagegen haben die Kinder. Ich organisiere Ihre Termine. Ich spreche dreihundert Sprachen, und ich bin ganz ze Ihrer Verfügung als Sexualpartner.”

Minho’s not even surprised at how easy he speaks. He’s seen it multiple times before.

“Say it in French?”

“Je suis la troisième génération Android. Je peux m’occuper de votre maison, faire la cuisine, s’occuper des enfants. J’organise vos rendez-vous. Je parle trois cents langues et je suis entièrement à votre disposition un partenaire sexuel.”

While he speaks, his legs get attached to his body, until he’s finally completely finished and the machine puts him down.

“Multilingual verbal expression check.”

The man says it without even looking up, too caught up in looking if everything Gally’s said was right and not even noticing that he’s slowly stepping forward. His first steps into the world, Minho thinks.

It’d almost be poetic if he hadn’t seen it so many times already.

“Take a few steps,” he says, not as loud as the other guys giving orders, but Gally still hears him. He looks up, searching for the source of the noise, and he meets Minho’s gaze as he takes another step forward. Tentative, but he can do it.

Minho finds himself staring at Gally; the way he moves almost effortlessly. Fluidly.

He turns around, a slow smile spreading on his face, and once again they can see how his limbs become less _robot_ and more _human_ crossing each and every line they probably should never even get close to.

“Locomotion checked.”

Minho nods, writes it down on the last line on his paper.

They’re done.

“You’re ready for work, buddy.”

Gally looks up, a combination of surprise and… _worry_? Is it really worry? Minho can’t tell for sure. Not when Gally’s entire body suddenly looks so _real_ , nothing like the pile of artificial limbs and wires that came in ten minutes ago.

“What’s going to happen to me now?” he asks.

“We’ll reinitialize you and send you to a store to be sold.”

It’s harsh. But it’s the truth. Minho knows it is. And they’re robots, so it’s not like they know any different, he tells himself.

“Sold? I’m sold for merchandise. Is that right?”

It’s not the first time someone’s asked for that.

But it is the first time Minho has seen someone look so troubled while doing that, Gally’s features so expressive as he looks between all the people present, silently asking for an explanation.

He’s not sure what that means.

“Of course you’re merchandise, buddy. You’re a computer with arms and legs, and capable of doing all sorts of things. You’re worth a fortune.”

“I see,” Gally whispers, a frown on his face as he watches them. Looking _sad_ ¸ Minho thinks. There’s no other word for it then sad. “I thought…”

“You _thought_?”

Janson interrupts him, going through his own paperwork again and shaking his head quickly. “What did you think?”

Gally shifts on his feet, and despite being a nearly six feet tall machine, he looks so lost and out of place. So tiny.

No one dares to move – even their equipment has gone still, even though that’s mostly because the procedure is done.

“I thought,” Gally starts again, voice soft and careful. It’s almost like he has to swallow, but that can’t be true. That _is_ not true. “I thought I was alive.”

Minho feels nausea creep over him, breath hitching in his throat at those words.

“Shit, what is this crap? That’s not part of the protocol. More memory components going off the rails.”

His boss sounds tired while saying that, like he’s not bothered by what’s happening but merely annoyed. Irritated that they’ll have to do all their work over again. Like he didn’t _hear_ what Gally just told them.

“Defective model,” he speaks, “disassemble and check the required components.”

Immediately, the machines come to life again, picking Gally up and –

Taking him apart.

“You’re disassembling me but why?”

There’s a crack in his voice, one that shouldn’t _be_ there, but it _is_.

“You’re not supposed to think that sort of stuff. You’re not supposed to think at all, period. You must have a defective piece or a software problem.”

Minho watches how Gally tries to kick the machines away, how he tries to break free, but they’re better than him. He may be a robot; they still get the upper hand.

“No, I feel perfectly fine, I assure you, everything is alright.”

No matter what he says, they won’t stop.

“I answered all the tests correctly, didn’t I?”

Skin is ripped off, revealing his mechanical body again, and still he tries to break free from the grip they have on him.

“Yes, but your behavior is non-standard.”

Minho can’t believe his boss is staying so calm underneath all of this.

He’s dropped his clipboard long ago, watching intently. They’re not _really_ going to take him apart again, are they?

(They are, something inside of him says. They’ve done it before, he knows they have. But never when he was around and the reasons were always nonfunctioning limbs or defective speech. Not this, not their android thinking that – not their android _thinking_.)

“Please, I’m begging you, please don’t disassemble me.”

“I’m sorry buddy, but defective models have to be eliminated. That’s my job. If a client comes back with a complaint, I’m going to have some explaining to do.”

“I’ll take him,” Minho whispers, but it’s overpowered by Gally’s pleas again.

“I won’t cause any problems,” he says, right as his chest is opened and wires get disconnected, software gets taken out again.

“I’ll do everything I’m asked to,” his legs are gone, taken away within seconds, “I won’t say another word,” his arms follow quickly after, leaving him not able to do anything, “I won’t _think_ anymore.”

He’s getting more and more desperate, his voice getting louder and louder as he speaks, almost hysterical even, and Minho can’t stand watching it.

“Please,” he whispers, “he says he’ll behave. Just give him another chance.”

Janson sends him the dirtiest look he can manage, probably, but doesn’t focus more attention to him.

“I’ve only just been born you can’t kill me yet. Stop, _please_ , will you please stop.”

It goes on and on, until Gally’s nothing but screaming, voice wavering as they reach to take out his – heart, battery? Minho’s not sure anymore.

“I’m scared,” he finally exclaims, dangerously close to what Minho would’ve called tears if it were anyone else.

The machines still, no one says anything.

Gally’s heart is beating visibly in his chest, loud and quick.

“I want to live,” he whispers.

Minho doesn’t dare to breathe.

After another minute of silence, in which no one is really sure what to do, Minho clears his throat again. “Please,” he whispers as well. “Just… just let him live.”

“We can’t sell him like this.”

That seems to be the final answer, the last answer, and when his boss opens his mouth again, Minho _knows_ it’s to say the final word, to make all of this undone. To stop Gally from existing.

“I’ll take him.”

More gasps from the other people in the room.

Minho can’t bring himself to look away from Gally, who’s staring at him with big eyes, _pleading_.

“I’ll take him. Different… different subject. I’ll report. How he’s functioning. My own test phase? To see if… if we have more… who react like this. If they’ll… be able to listen. I’ll keep him and see what he does.”

He’s stammering, sweating too, probably, but in his gut he knows this is the right thing to do. He _can’t_ let them disassemble this guy. Robot. Whatever he is.

Janson doesn’t say anything, just nods, and a second later the machines make work of putting Gally back together again, adding his arms and legs and feet and closing his chest and fixing his back and making him look just as human again as he did before.

“Thank you,” Gally whispers once he’s being put down again.

His second first steps, Minho thinks.

“Go and join him.”

Minho walks forward, to the edge of the platform he’s being built on, watches as Gally does the same.

“Stay in line,” he hears Janson say, but he’s not really listening anymore. All he can think of is that this… this robot that has shown more humanity than any of them ever have done before… this person made of his own technology. He now belongs to him.

And he’s going to have to take care of him. And report his behavior.

And he has no idea what he just started.

(But he still takes Gally’s hand to help him off the platform, even though he knows Gally doesn’t need it, and he guides him out of the lab and to his little office, where he gives Gally clothes so he can get dressed. And he still takes Gally home after that, hoping they’ll be okay.)


End file.
